“Remember Nanette Shipley? She’s the literary scout who claimed credit for discovering and helping a company called Maverick Films launchfilms, Twilight and The Lighting Thief. Now comes word that Shipley has demonstrated to a Los Angeles Superior Court judge that she is likely to prevail in her claims. As a result, the judge has granted Shipley’s request to freeze $100,000 of Maverick’s assets pending the outcome of the lawsuit.

As we reported in February, Shipley alleged that she helped Maverick find and obtain the rights to both motion pictures. She said she was promised $75,000 for her work in connection with Twilight and $100,000 for her work in connection with The Lighting Thief, and was owed all but $20,000 of the total amount.

According to the attorneys for both parties, a few days before a Superior Court hearing on the matter, Maverick sent over a $55,000 check to satisfy what was owed to Shipley for Twilight.”

This case should proved to be an interesting one as there are a lot of players involved here. Maverick has changed hands several times ( it was initially launched by Madonna of all people). More recently it underwent a name change and is now Imprint, a name you will find in Twilight film end credits. Maverick films obtained the rights to the production and then worked with Summit to actually get Twilight made, and now works with them under the Imprint moniker.

Summit isn’t directly involved in this one. Think of Maverick/Imprint like a subcontractor. Summit presumably thought Maverick had appropriately obtained all rights and paid its staff. In other words, call Summit the owner of a condo complex. Let’s say they need a new pool for the complex and they contract with some firm to do that. It’s that subcontracted firm’s responsibility so see that it’s workers are paid correctly, not the guy who owns the condo.

It’s really starting to seem like it’s official Twilight movie lawsuit month and someone forgot to tell us. Here is the latest in legal action surrounding the Twilight movies:

“An Ohio musician with ambitious plans to have his music heard by fans of “The Twilight Saga” is now suing the film’s distributor, Summit Entertainment, for standing in his way.

Matthew Smith, who works under the moniker Matt Heart, created a song entitled “Eternal Knight” in 2002. This past November, Heart engaged in a bold marketing campaign to connect the song to new audiences.

He posted the song on YouTube and sold it via iTunes, CD Baby, Amazon and other sites. Most audaciously, he says he negotiated to distribute and promote the song in various movie theaters for 28 weeks, hoping to reach an estimated 5 million viewers via an agreement with Screen Vision, which sells ads in theaters around the nation.

But Heart got into trouble when he commissioned a CD cover for “Eternal Knight” indicating it was inspired by the “Twilight Saga.” The cover art shows a moon and uses a similar typeface to that of “Twilight’s” movie poster.”

“A woman who claims credit for discovering Twilight as a potential feature film is demanding payment for her role in helping launch one of Hollywood’s biggest movie franchises.

Nanette Shipley says in a lawsuit filed Thirsday [sic]in Los Angeles Superior Court that she was “a literary scout,” whose job was to find potential feature films for Maverick Films. Shipley claims enormous success, helping Maverick find and obtain the rights for two motion pictures, Twilight and The Lighting Thief. She says her complaint against Marverick and topper Mark Morgan that she was promised $75,000 for her work in connection with Twilight and $100,000 for her work in connection with The Lighting Thief.

She says she’s only been paid $20,000 and wants the outstanding $155,000 plus legal costs.”

It should be noted that this lawsuit is filed against Maverick Films which is now known as Imprint Films. It is not part of Summit Entertainment. In layman’s terms Summit is an umbrella group working with other groups such as Imprint and others such as Wyck Godfrey’s Temple Hill Entertainment to pull off the Twilight movies. In a way think of it like a construction firm that hires a bunch a subcontractors. The head of the construction management isn’t involved if one of the subcontracted electricians is claiming his paycheck doesn’t reflect the right overtime, he has to deal with his boss, not the guy that his boss is then doing business with.

At the time of this article we couldn’t locate an official website for the company, just their facebook page. The description of their company reads:

“Imprint Entertainment, which is based on the Universal Studios Lot in Burbank, California, was founded by Michael Becker and Mark Morgan in 2008. The company is a full service film / television production and management company.

Imprint Entertainment has over two-dozen projects currently in development, pre-production and production. The Company’s most recent films Twilight, and Twilight Saga: New Moon, based on the best-selling novel by the same names for Summit Entertainment, was released in November 2008 and November 2009, respectively. The company also produced The Stepfather for Sony Screen Gems and Hit and Run for MGM, and is in post-production on the independent film Slightly Single in LA.

Imprint Entertainment’s management division currently represents a range of clients for film and television, which include platinum selling music artist Soulja Boy, as well as the newly signed Slip N Slide artist and actress Drew Sidora. Imprint also represents top music video director Dale “Rage” Resteghini and film and television writers Reed Steiner, Dyan Traynor, Joany Kane, Jay White, James Bird among many others.”